The latest device a AI is the chat.
It is Rumoured to supplant scribes, teachers and misguide the seekers of real knowledge.
while the fake and the real debate has many shades, what is of concern is education.
the higher powers are all worked up and search is on for effective responses.
one of them is to make the students face the test or examination and award grades on their performance.
good enough but in this season of paper leaks how does one guarantee the results ?
a colleague of mine who is no more brought in his expertise and caught the students using sophisticated devices in the exam hall.
he was a professor of communications and had the edge over the cheats.
then he was framed in a case from which he extricated himself with difficulty .
what happened next was even more appalling.
after his retirement in the university he was serving as principal of a college.
the unfortunate aspect was that he was politically connected also.
someone planted the idea that such a one as he deserved to be vice chancellor , no less.
now it is common knowledge that such posts carry a premium.
and perhaps the premium was arranged at great cost.
when the list was out his name was missing.
because of his age he had also forfeited his chance for ever.
his last moments were spent with his wife .
they had a long conversation, it is said, and he went into his room.
next day he was discovered dead.
harking back to glory days we had an editor who could, at a glance, decipher the motive behind a letter writer.
i have also met a few gentlemen who could read your minds effortlessly.
perhaps technology has made these skills redundant.
here comes the challenge.
how to distinguish between the real and the fake ?
in my experience no spellcheck could differentiate between there and their, or hear and here.
if the technology has improved i would not know.
spellcheck threw the tribe of proofreaders out of the newsrooms.
god knows how many would be losing their jobs due to this device.
let me round this off with an amusing anecdote.
a manuscript from an aspiring writer landed on George Bernard Shaw's table.
after perusing it, shaw sent this response.
your novel is both good and original.
where it is good , it is not original and where it is original, it is not good.
reminds me of another incident.
an author walks into a publisher's den and offers his ms.
after scrutinising it, the publisher queries whether it is his own writing.
the author says yes.
the publisher stands up, and with due reverence shakes hands with the author and greets him warmly :
i am honoured to meet you , william shakespeare.!
